Council on Dairy Cattle Breeding Charts New Course for the Future

Council on Dairy Cattle Breeding Charts New Course for the Future

The Council on Dairy Cattle Breeding (CDCB) met in Madison, Wis., Oct. 7-8, 2012. Following extensive industry discussion and planning, CDCB is moving forward ensuring the future leadership position for the U.S. dairy industry in genetic evaluations and management benchmarks. Through collaboration within the U.S. dairy industry, CDCB’s plan will uphold the U.S. gold standard in developing and delivering high quality dairy genetics and management tools to dairy producers.

Meeting discussions centered on the proposed Business Plan and Cooperative Agreement, which had previously been available to the industry for comment. The proposed Business Plan and industry comments were presented to CDCB for discussion. After review, CDCB endorsed the proposed Business Plan as a roadmap for the new structure, with CDCB agreeing to a conference call in late October to review follow up refinements and changes. CDCB directors agreed to seek recommendations from assigned working groups for three specific areas in the Business Plan relating to: 1) bylaw changes, 2) Purebred Dairy Cattle Association (PDCA) quality certification of type, and 3) delivery of genomic evaluations for males beyond 15 months of age.

The latest draft of the Non-funded Cooperative Agreement with the U.S. Department of Agriculture-Agricultural Research Service (USDA-ARS) along with industry comments were presented to the CDCB. The Council’s directors authorized Chair Ole Meland to work with USDA-ARS on the final version and sign the Cooperative Agreement as ARS has indicated they are intending to do before the end of December 2012.

CDCB also considered proposed changes to the organization’s bylaws, which will enable CDCB to move forward on the new course. CDCB is working with its legal counsel in revising the governance structure outlined in the bylaws. The revamped CDCB bylaws will incorporate:

Each sector association will have three voting directors and allied industry may have up to two non-voting directors. A mechanism for allied industry to move to voting status will be provided in the future.

After in-depth discussion by CDCB, there is broad industry agreement for the new structure and direction to serve the best interests of U.S. dairy producers.